Do You Take Your Kids Out of School to Go to Disneyland?

[T0rrent]

Honestly, as someone who was pulled out of school for a week to go to Disneyworld, I don't really understand the hate on it. Sometimes when you are organizing a larger family trip, it may be the only way. It was my Junior year in High School, about 6 weeks before the end of the year if I remember correctly. My brother was in elementary school at the time. We gave our teachers about a months notice, in most of my classes I just worked ahead as I knew what was going to be covered while I was gone. Neither of us fell behind, and well everyone had a great trip, outside of me as I came down with the flu and a 101 degree fever the morning after we arrived. Missed a full day at disney, our one day at epcot, and probably could have been cast in a zombie movie when we went to the shuttle site and got to watch the shuttle being moved to the launch pad. Probably learned more in that one day there at NASA then I did most of the year.

In the end, there is no right or wrong answer. Only the parents of the child will know if it will have a negative impact on the child. What works best for you and your child very well may not be what works best for another person's child.

 

[SweetAlex]

Actually, my DDs teacher (grade 2) was SO excited for my daughter's trip (she missed 5 days) and even encouraged it claiming that she is a firm believer that children should take as many opportunities as possible to travel and learn more about different places in the world and have different experiences that they would NEVER learn about stuck in a traditional classroom. My kids learned about different cultures, tried new foods, refined their social skills by meeting new people, practiced math by timing rides and calculating wait times, watched various theatre shows, learned how to draw, learned a bit of Spanish and bonus... stayed OFF electronic devices for 6 days straight. No school would ever be able to teach my kids all that in a mere 6 days. This wouldn't apply as much to local children but for us who travelled a distance, it sure did.

It's true. Kids learn a LOT when they are exploring new places and taking in new cultures and experiences... even AT Disneyland. Education is not only found inside a book or building with concrete walls... it's all around you. Those who think otherwise are completely narrow-minded.

My girls had no problem catching back up after coming back. I'm sure it might be more challenging for some kids but teachers and parents can work together on finding ways to continue with school work or plan ahead well to make it easier. If going during school is the only time you can take your family vacation, I don't think missing a few days of classroom learning should ever stop you.

 

[Aladora]

As a child, I was pulled out of school for the entire month of December every 3 years so we could go visit family in South Africa. I brought work to do on the trips and some times I did a lot of work and others I did very little. I had no problem catching up when I got back to school.

Two years ago, when DS was in grade 2 we pulled him out mid September for 3 days for a Disney trip and next month we are pulling him out for 4 days for another Disney trip. He has his home reading to do while we are gone and I have a binder of math for him to work on but other than that, I am not concerned about him missing a few days.

To answer the OP, it is our responsibility to see that our child gets an education and so far his father and I are living up to that responsibility. Taking a child out of school for a few days out of the school year does not mean that the child is not getting an education.

 

[GeminiAngel]

Stuns me to see how many folks will pull their kids out of school to avoid lines - I mean, you made the choice to have children, isn't it your responsibility to get them to school to educate them?

I pull my daughter out every year for a couple of days in Feb. Straight A student, in student council, President of the Best Buddies International chapter in her school. Its like big brother's for special needs kids.

So I think I have lived up to my responsibility. Oh yeah, and she's a tutor.

 

[Indiana Scott]

I was pulled out of grade school once or twice to go to DL back in the 60's.
The teacher gave me a lesson plan and worksheets to do and when I got back, I found I was actually ahead of the class by a few days.
At any rate, nearly 50 years later and I've suffered no ill effects.

 

[ImarriedGrumpy]

My son has missed 4 days of school in his entire educational career thus far. He's working 2 grade levels ahead of his class in reading and math. His handwriting is admittedly atrocious, and there's still room for improvement in his spelling, so when I take him out of school for our trip to DLR in March, his homework will be to keep a journal and take some time every day to write about what he's doing. We've already picked out chapter books to read out loud to each other in line, and I couldn't get him to stop talking about math if I tried!! (and yes, I confess sometimes I get so tired of discussing math problems that I have told him that I need a break from math and can we please talk about something else for a while. And then usually I have to listen to Minecraft lectures...)

His teacher is well aware of the trip, and also knows that the standard homework she assigns the class is just busy work for DS, so we've set up alternate homework to keep him challenged. The school uses adaptive learning tools that are available online to us, so DS has been able to charge ahead of his peers in reading and math skills. I made sure that I'm not taking him out during a week when there is a major project or special event happening for his class, and we're even getting back in time for me to volunteer at my usual time on Friday morning teaching an art lesson.

So no, I don't think his education will suffer when I take him out for a few days. As he gets older, we might not pull him out again. But I'll make that choice each year as we evaluate where he is and what is happening in his classroom. I very much respect and value the teachers at his school, and I'm thankful that they recognize that involved parents have a huge impact on the child's educational success, too.

I absolutely agree that there are kids who need to be in school every single day they possibly can. If DS were out a lot because of illness or some other family emergency and fell behind in his studies, there is no way I would take him out of school for a vacation. But that simply isn't our situation, and even the school principal is excited for us and told us to say hi to Mickey for her!

 

[missbrooke06]

I was pulled out of grade school once or twice to go to DL back in the 60's. The teacher gave me a lesson plan and worksheets to do and when I got back, I found I was actually ahead of the class by a few days. At any rate, nearly 50 years later and I've suffered no ill effects.

Yeah, come talk to me in another 50 years and we'll see how you're doing.

 

[ChloroformSdxn]

I think it's a non-issue. If your kid is struggling in school, then that's a decision you have to make. The occasional vacation (and it's the rare parent that can afford, both time and money-wise to pull their kid out of school for Disney vacations enough that it impacts their academic careers), isn't going to have much of an impact. If anything, you can use it as an opportunity to talk about doing extra work ahead of time so that you aren't catching up later.

 

[Tinker1972]

Yep..we take our kids out of school for a few days each year to go to Disneyland. Both of my daughters also dance, so they miss a few days each year due to dance competitions as well. I don't get any vacation during the summer, and from March-June is competition season, so we usually travel in the fall. All 4 of my kids are good students, I have no problems with them missing a few days of school. We usually try to plan our holidays around Pro-D days but it doesn't always work out that way. My oldest is in grade 11 and has had no issues missing a few days of school

 

[Canadian Harmony]

I've never (in the past 6 years) taken my kids out of school for a vacation. That will change in October. And I don't really care! I have friends who take their children out all the time for holidays. They're in low grades, it's not going to make a difference to what university they get into at this stage.

I talked to the teacher my youngest will have in October and she said she won't even bother sending homework because she has no idea what the class will be working on. If we get desperate, we can use some online stuff to keep the synapses rolling.

I'm not concerned at all. My oldest is always going to be behind due to her difficulties. A week out of school in grade 6 won't ruin her.

 

[mamaofthree]

I'm curious if the OP has children? Have you ever visited a public school classroom? I'm not saying it's a waste of time, but at many schools there is a lot of wasted time throughout the day, at least in elementary school. Missing a few days or even a week for vacation is not going to put an average or above average student behind IMO. Sure, if they are older, it's a huge PITA to make up work and make up tests, but that's up to the family. I personally have never taken my kids out of school for vacation because dh is a teacher. We take vacations on holidays and summer break when everyone else is off and it's crazy busy. That's just the way it is. But I would LOVE to be able to take vacations, especially Disney ones, during "off season" and would have no problem pulling my kids out for a day or two. Anything they are doing in class I can teach them myself (so far lol) and I completely agree with the person that said life experiences can teach you way more than sitting in a classroom. There is much more to life than sitting at a desk. Even if it is just great family memories and not an ounce of bookwork learned for a few days.

 

[disneychrista]

I'm curious if the OP has children? Have you ever visited a public school classroom?

Just to be fair the OP did not start this as a thread. It & other posts were taken from another thread and put into its own.

 

[mamaofthree]

Just to be fair the OP did not start this as a thread. It & other posts were taken from another thread and put into its own.

Got it! Def takes away some of the sting lol.

 

[Sherry E]

The OP still made the comments/stated the opinions in the first post -- those were not created by anyone else. But that post -- along with a lot of responses to that specific post -- was moved into a new thread.

So the conversation was still begun by that original comment. The only issue was that the conversation was taking up too much time/space in another thread, and derailing that whole thread's subject. To get the other thread back on topic I took all of the comments about this subject and moved them to a separate thread. The thread needed a specific title, so I added it. But everything else was a conversation/debate already in the making, just moved from one thread to another.

 

[ranman1973]

We try to minimize the time away from school, but yes, we do take our kids out of school.

 

[whitneyebz]

We took the kids out last week for disney. It was 2 days (we left after school on wednesday, 5-6 hour drive to disneyland). Yes I chose to have these kids and it's my responsibility to make sure they are educated, and I AM doing that. My daughter had not missed ONE day all year, and my son had only missed 1. We're in AZ so no snow days to worry about, and my kids don't get sick often. I figure, some kids miss a whole week due to sickness, so we can miss 2-3 days a year for disney. I refuse to pay large sums of money so we can stand in line for hours. We choose the off season and have a blast! We also took them out of school for a week to go to CO and visit my brother and his family so DH could help him with a project. Is that irresponsible? Not sure, but the teachers were just fine with it and my kids are doing very well in school. I had them each write a letter to their teachers about their trip, as well as draw pictures.

 

[Geemo]

When my adult kids were in school we had Year Round School. 9weeks on 3weeks off, it was great! We were able to take trips in many different times of the year. Two of my grandkids were home schooled, so we had flexibility there.

The other two grankdkids are in public school (middle school) and I get the school calendar as soon as it's approved. I look for any three days off tied into a weekend. That's when I'll book a trip. School's hard enough, even when they go every day. Missing school for a pleasure trip isn't an option in this family.

Every family has to decide what's best for them.

Geemo

 

[MommyJKM]

The OP still made the comments/stated the opinions in the first post -- those were not created by anyone else. But that post -- along with a lot of responses to that specific post -- was moved into a new thread.

Thank you for editing, Sherry E!
My family doesn't find it an issue to take your kids out of school for holiday trips, education can be executed in many ways, not always by sitting in a classroom.

My daughter is in pre-school now but her future Elementary/High School school district uses Google Classroom - so you get your assignments and do your homework online and turn it in and get graded at the same time. So, when we do inevitably let her miss a week of school because we chose to take vacation at that time, we, as her parents, will monitor her work and she will still be expected to keep up with the other kids and do the same work.

But maybe the OP has never heard of taking homework with you on vacation....or technology for that matter.

 

[heybets30]

We pull our kids out of school up to twice a year for vacations. Never thought twice about it. Usually one week in late September for Disneyland, then again in the Spring for Disneyland. We did skip a fall 2014 trip so that we could save for a trip to Aulani/Hawaii in the Fall of 2015.

We try to schedule our vacations around long weekends, so the kids only miss 3-4 days rather than a week. My kids are in a large public school, Kindergarten and Grade 2. The teachers and administrators could not be more supportive of vacations (I'm sure only for those who don't abuse it). They look at it as quality family time, with potential learning outside the school. Our kindergartener was given a blank travel book hand made by his teacher "Bon Voyage Andrew". In it, she has asked him to write something every day about the trip and to draw a little picture with each text. He's so excited about it, he doesn't even realize he is still learning and doing work. When he gets back, he'll give a report to the class about the trip AND gets to bring in a souvenir to show everyone (at kindergarten, show & tell is EVERYTHING). Same with my daughter. She's in accelerated math/reading/language groups right now, and while she might miss a spelling or math test, she'll gain almost 8 hours of reading to & from Chicago to LAX on the plane. We have her keep a journal of our trips too. Everything reinforces learning- writing, reading, spelling. My husband and I don't feel teaching is fully on the teachers, as parents, it is our responsibility to teach them too. Our district dropped cursive from its curriculum - my daughter and I will also practice cursive on the plane to kill time. Things like that - we buy those Brain Quest workbooks, and the kids think they are fun.

I know when the kids get older, it will be much harder to remove them from school for 3-4 days/a week at a time. We don't travel during summer or spring/winter breaks because of the cost and availability factor. My husband only gets 2 weeks vacation, I get 4. He doesn't want to spend what little time he has hassling crowds. He wants the family time to be as calm as possible. And, our savings from going off season, definitely allow us to take 2 really nice vacations a year.

My father-in-law lives in Lake Elsinore, CA, and while he is still with us, we will most likely make DL/SoCal our destination of choice (except for our trip to HI for our 10-year anniversary)!!

 

[HollyL]

I am so with you Lovebug. My husband recently became certified to teach (mid life career change) and is currently guest teaching until he finds something permanent. He is hoping to teach 4th or 5th grade. My Mom was also a teacher, and yes, many teachers do spend a lot of time on their lesson plans and it really isn't fair to expect them to cater to people who choose to take their kids out for a week for recreational purposes. Personally, sure, if parents choose to take their kids out, that's their personal choice, and it's not my place to judge, but do realize that you may be creating an extra burden for their teacher. Teacher don't get to just take a week off for fun, just keep that in mind.